This is what a rocket jump should look like. Pay close attention to how the rocket jumper's legs are still firmly attached to his body.

Rocket jumping was first introduced to gamers in id Software's 3D opus Quake in 1996 and has since been a vital cog in nearly every first person shooter since. Rocket jumping is performed by firing a rocket at your character's own feet and timing your jump so that the ensuing explosion launches you into the air. While this will cause you some damage, you will be elevated to heights that you could previously only dream of.

"I saw this one ledge playing Quake and it looked like a sweet place to be, but I just couldn't get up there," said admitted Quake junkie Ralph Moore. "Then I discovered rocket jumping and got up there and found some shotgun ammo! I was the envy of both my friends."

This was the concept that North Carolina man Ted Baxter had in mind when he inadvertently blew both his legs off with a homemade rocket launcher only a week ago.

"Me and my son were throwing around the Frisbee when an arrant throw landed it on the roof," recalled Baxter. "We were having so much fun that we didn't want it to end, but I had lost my ladder in a poker game earlier that week and had no other way to get up there."

Remembering his glory days as the local Quake and Unreal Tournament champion, Baxter fashioned a homemade rocket launcher from directions he found on the internet and assorted parts from his neighbor's Cadillac.

"The plan was perfect, just shoot a rocket at my feet, jump, and let the blast propel me onto the roof," said Baxter. "Unfortunately, something went horribly wrong, something that no one could ever have imagined."

Baxter fired the rocket and jumped, but the ensuing explosion did little to get him onto his roof. Instead, it blew his legs into hundreds of pieces and sent his upper torso flying into a tree in the complete opposite direction.

"When I saw my dad had no legs and was covered in blood, I knew I had to get help," said Baxter's son Jimmy.

Though covered in charred bits of his father, Jimmy neglected his own personal hygiene and immediately called the paramedics. Upon arriving, they bandaged the wounds the best they could then transferred Baxter to Jefferson County Hospital where he was pronounced "lucky to be alive".

"Fortunately the heat from the rocket blast cauterized the wound or else Mr. Baxter would have bled to death before we ever could have reached him," said paramedic Jason Douglass. "We see this sort of thing in about half of all rocket launcher related injuries."

Baxter spent the next nine hours in surgery, teetering close to death. He finally stabilized and began the slow steps to recovery.

While Baxter insists that this accident was unavoidable, possibly God's vengeance against him for cheating on his taxes, there are some people that feel otherwise.

"This entire incident all came down to bad timing," said the surgeon that treated Baxter. "If Mr. Baxter had jumped a half second earlier he would have landed safely on the roof, or if I would have gone home a half hour earlier, I could have spent the evening making love to a three foot tall midget named Doris<